My duck eggs are having a high mortality rate when incubating.

natyvidal · Feb 19, 2022

Hi everyone. Thank you ahead of time.
I acquired Cayuga Ducks and Ancona. When I noticed that the mothers were not going broodie I decided to incubate them. The problem is that I am having a 50% hatchability if not less from the eggs. They are developing and trying to hatch but dying in the intent. Some not even trying to hatch dying in the egg fully formed.

The humidity is being kept at 70% and temp at 38 cent. What am I doing wrong? This last group the humidity went quite high 80 and 90? Is that bad? Maybe to much humidity?

Here are some pictures. Your input is greatly appreciated.

Pyxis · Feb 19, 2022

natyvidal said:
The humidity is being kept at 70% and temp at 38 cent.

Is that 70% for the entire incubation period? If so, that's too high. It should be around 30 to 40 percent for the first 25 days, and only 70% for the last three.

cheezenkwackers · Feb 20, 2022

As the duckling develops water evaporates from inside the egg through the eggshell. If the humidity is too high that can’t happen. As a result the ducklings get too big and the air cell is too small. The ducklings become too big to move inside the shell and hatch. At least this is how it was explained to me. I switched to dry hatching unless my air cells looked too big and only add water at lock down. My hatch rate has gone up dramatically, last one was 100%.

indianaducks · Feb 22, 2022

I've only hatched duck eggs once (a few months ago). I started with 10 eggs, and had 6 hatch and was told that was a pretty good hatch rate. I kept the humidity more around the 40-50% range until the last few days when it got much higher during lockdown. Also, your 38* C may be too high. I think my incubator was more around 99.5* F which would be a little lower than yours. What kind of incubator?

natyvidal · Mar 2, 2022

Pyxis said:
Is that 70% for the entire incubation period? If so, that's too high. It should be around 30 to 40 percent for the first 25 days, and only 70% for the last three.

That is correct. I meant to say 45% humidity during incubation and around 70% at hatching time.

Magnolia Ducks · Mar 2, 2022

Sounds like humidity deaths.

Magnolia Ducks · Mar 2, 2022

Also I'm high humidity climate. I dry hatch in the summer. Sorry for your losses but keep trying you get better with practice. I didn't get live birds till the third time and I currently get 90% hatch if fertile.

Magnolia Ducks · Mar 2, 2022

Oh and 37.5C is high enough. So temp down and humidity down. Do you have more baby pictures?

My duck eggs are having a high mortality rate when incubating.

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